Daily Search Forum Recap: January 14, 2009

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

Google Creates Traffic Based Sitemaps Generator
The Google Webmaster Central blog announced the release of a new Google Sitemaps generator available at code.google.com/p/googlesitemapgenerator. The new tool works differently then other sitemaps tools. The tool "finds new and modified URLs based on your webserver's traffic, its log files, or the files found on the server," said Google. Plus the tool will send pings to Google Blog Search for all new or modified URLs in the XML file. It is pretty neat to

Google Webmaster Tools Missing Change Site Verification Method?
A Google Webmaster Help thread reports that Google Webmaster Tools seems to be missing the feature to change the method you would like to verify you site with. Now, I personally don't remember what should or should not be on this screen, but reportedly, there should be a way to tell Google that you want to switch from the html file verification method to the meta tag verification method, or visa versa. Here is a

Carol Bartz To Take CEO Role At Yahoo, Decker On Out
I am sure by now, most of you heard the news that is buzzing all over the Internet. Carol Bartz Joins Yahoo as Chief Executive Officer is the headline of the Yahoo press release. Here is her impressive bio: Carol Bartz, a veteran technology executive who was most recently Executive Chairman of Autodesk (NASDAQ: ADSK), has been named Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors, effective immediately. Prior to becoming Executive

Google AdWords Prefers Not To Use Multiple Match Types For Single Keyword Phrase
There is an interesting paid search thread over at WebmasterWorld on the topic of using match types. For newbies, match types basically give you the ability to tell how specific or broad you want Google to match your keywords. So if you want Google to show your ad for the keyword phrase blue widget, and variations of it, like big widget that is blue, you use a specific match type. For more on how match

Help Penalize Your Favorite Retailer
I figured I take a different look at Matt's Give Google feedback on "noresults" pages. In short, Matt Cutts of Google wants you to submit feedback to Google on search results that lead to reviews, but those reviews don't actually have a review. For example, Matt McGee points out one example of this at Search Engine Land. A search for sd880is reviews returns a result that shows this: That is what Matt said most people

The Tale of a Server Hack, Followed By Google Ban: Stages
A senior member at WebmasterWorld who started posting in 2004, had his server hacked into. He realized this when Google put a temporary ban on his site from showing up in the Google search results. Google does this, because they want to protect searchers from landing on pages that might contain malware or other infectious programs. The thread goes through the different stages a webmaster goes through when finding out their site has been hacked